After opening remarks by each guest, National Geographic Weekend radio host Boyd Matson brought them together and steered the topics, taking questions from the audience as well. Amazement at the complexity of chimpanzee relationships and behavior was common, as was interest in Myerson’s vision of how governments might run more smoothly and enjoy more support from their citizens.

Through it all, the thing that seemed to captivate everyone most though was how many attitudes and behaviors that we think of as “human” are shared by chimps as well. To list just a few, Jill described instances of chimps:

sharing

peacefully accepting it when others don’t share

making tools for hunting

adopting orphans

males getting jealous of each other

juveniles carrying and playing with “dolls” (namely the bodies of other small animals they accidentally killed)

having groups of specific friends

remembering past kindnesses and conflicts

having individual habits when playing or relaxing at the watering hole

and much more.

The Big Question

So the big question is: Given all these similarities, what is the most important difference between chimp and human society?

Meet the Author

Andrew Howley is a longtime contributor to the National Geographic blog, with a particular focus on archaeology and paleoanthropology generally, and ancient rock art in particular. In 2018 he became Communications Director at Adventure Scientists, founded by Nat Geo Explorer Gregg Treinish. Over 11 years at the National Geographic Society, Andrew worked in various ways to share the stories of NG explorers and grantees online. He also produced the Home Page of nationalgeographic.com for several years, and helped manage the Society's Facebook page during its breakout year of 2010. He studied Anthropology with a focus on Archaeology from the College of William & Mary in Virginia. He has covered expeditions with NG Explorers-in-Residence Mike Fay, Enric Sala, and Lee Berger. His personal interests include painting, running, and reading about history. You can follow him on Twitter @anderhowl and on Instagram @andrewjhowley.

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